Welcome Kiwi II

After a processing time out of 2 days we continued our journey south. In Moeraki we admired the 'Boulders' - completely round boulders - scattered on the beach as if randomly thrown. It's strange what nature creates. For lunch we had local fish prepared in a wonderful restaurant located at the end of a peninsula. A few months ago, Rick Stein (who often visits us on TV with culinary travel reports) also praised the landlady in the highest tones. We were particularly impressed by the stylish ambiance and very friendly service. A visit to a nearby peninsula where seal colonies and penguins live rounded off our stay in Moeraki. We picked banana passion fruits after watching children harvest them by the dozen. Inside, they are similar to passion fruit and surrounded by a kind of banana peel.

Soon we reached the southernmost tip of New Zealand with Bluff.

From the beginning of the journey, the club flag of the YCB (Yacht Club Bregenz) was an essential part of our travel luggage. The goal was to hand over our flag to a responsible person from the southernmost yacht club. However, finding a responsible person turned out to be very difficult. After numerous attempts, we finally found a member of the BYC (Bluff Yacht Club), namely Craig Smith, through the tip of an older employee of a small supermarket. We arranged to meet him in his office in Invercargill, where he kindly received us the next day, even though it was his first day of work after his summer vacation and he surely had important business matters to attend to. He was excited about the idea of exchanging flags and promised to send us one from Bluff by mail. We chatted a little about his and our sailing club with its various activities. Recently, the America's Cupper with Russel Coutts also visited Bluff. The club has about 40 members - many members also have trailer boats. When he talked about sailing, he really got enthusiastic. It seems that sailors also know each other in New Zealand.

This was the geographical turning point of our journey. From now on, we will steadily head north.

At Lake Te Anau, we visited the glowworm cave. We reached it by a catamaran. The publicly accessible cave extends about 250 meters into the mountain. After a walk, we boarded a boat, the lights went out, and above us thousands of these creatures shone like a breathtaking starry sky.

Everyone we met recommended a visit to Milford Sounds. Since you can only get there via a 115km long and winding dead-end road, we actually wanted to skip it, but if everyone is soooo excited about it..... Milford Sound is located in the middle of a national park called Fiordland. Soon it started raining and getting colder. From 26 degrees down to about 15 damp degrees. We were already doubting our decision. The landscape kept changing. From mountains to savannah, plateaus, dense forests, mountain passes, and finally rainforest-like forests with steep towering cliffs from which countless waterfalls plunge into the depths. In the end, it was an unreal, eerie place. However, the numerous sandflies that leave extremely unpleasant, itchy bites did not deter us from taking a cruise. Countless waterfalls cascade down from the steep mountains, which shine in the sun one minute and are covered in clouds two minutes later, into the fjord. Even a huge cruise ship looks tiny in this setting. This detour was really worth it. With a walk through the ghost forest, we left this area heading towards Lake Wanaka.

The Lord of the Rings was filmed in this area. The lake is located in the middle of the mountains at the foot of the Rob Roy Glacier. We earned this with a five-hour hike - we started at 40 degrees.

But now it's time for a laundry day. For this purpose, we're heading to the west coast. Due to Austria's close relations with New Zealand, we have pitched our tents in Franz Josef Glacier in memory of Sissi.